CUVEE ARTE ACA 
the Appendix to the Sale Catalogue of the Earl’s collection 
by G. B. Sowerby, F.L.S., in 1825. Only two specimens 
were known—the type and one in the cabinet of Mr. 
Sowerby. The type came into the possession of the British 
Museum. Its habitat was unknown. He remarked its 
resemblance to VU. tigris, but in the Zoological Journal of 
1826 indicated its diagnostics. 
The name C. wmbilicata had been previously attached 
to a shell by Solander, which Gray thinks was C. pyrum; but 
as Solander’s name was only in manuscript, and was never 
published, Sowerby’s specific name stands. 
In 1828 Dr. Gray discussed it, and suggested that as 
only one specimen was known it might be merely a mostrosity, 
a deformed (@. tigris; but if a good species, it should be placed 
in his newly created genus Cyprovula. 
G. B. Sowerby replied that two specimens were known 
which were quite alike; this supported the probability of its 
being a good species, allied rather to C. pantherina than to 
C. tigris. 
In 1837, however, Mr. Sowerby, in his Conchological Illus- 
trations, registered his species as a variety of 0. pantherina, 
Solander MSS., having evidently accepted the suggestion that 
it was only a variant or a monstrosity of this variable and 
well-known shell. 
Deshayes, in his 2nd Edition of Lamarck’s Anim. S. 
Vert., 1844, enters it among the synonyms of CU. tigrina, 
Lamarck; and Reeve, in his Conch. Icon. of 1845, under 
C. pantherina, Lamarck, says “C. wmbilicata has been ack- 
nowledged a monstrosity.” 
This degradation of the species to the position of a 
monstrosity was doubtless due to the peculiar deformed 
appearance of the shell and to the fact that for more than 
twenty years no other specimens had been found and its 
habitat was still unknown. But in 1848 Mr. Roland Gunn 
wrote to Dr. Gray about a collection of cowries he had found 
on “‘the east shore of Barren Island, one of Hunter’s islands, 
north-west of Van Diemen Land,” and he sent one fine speci- 
men to the British Museum. This Dr. Gray recognized as 
C. umbilicata, Sowerby, and placed definitely among his 
Cyprovule as “the giant of the genus,’’ removed the reproach 
of monstrosity from it, and established it as a true and very 
remarkable species, the home of which had at last been dis- 
covered. It immediately leaped into notoriety and became 
valuable, for the second specimen sent to England by Mr. 
Gunn realized the handsome sum of £30; whereas in my 
Tankerville Catalogue, in which have been written the prices 
